It’s a pity, then, that all they’re getting is a shiny badge. Are these not exactly the sort of people to whom we’d like to give more power to improve the country? We ought to seize the day, because we have the perfect opportunity: that vacuum of positivity, inspiration and accountability that is the current House of Lords.

Nick Clegg’s Lords reform plans faltered two summers ago because there was much to commend the hereditary system – including the randomness of the peers. They didn’t seek office, the role chose them. Those who turned up in the chamber did so out of a spirit of public service rather than lifelong political ambition. The same is true of the majority of Honours recipients, with the added bonus that you don’t have to be posh to get an OBE.

What if every person receiving an honour, right up from a humble MBE to a peerage, had the chance to opt on to a list of candidates for the Lords? Members would be chosen by lottery from these names and would hold their seats for five years. Once on the list you would have five chances to be selected before you were removed, with every new honour giving you another five chances; preventing the average age of members from creeping up.

The result would be a diverse collection of truly distinguished individuals from all walks of life, whose contribution to government would be more original and less partisan than anything the Peter Mandelsons of this world have to offer. We’d have more women, with no need for quotas, because, although few women succeed in politics, plenty distinguish themselves in medicine, journalism or theatre, comprising 51 per cent of the 2014 New Year’s Honours list – compared to 23 per cent of the current House of Lords.

An elected upper chamber would hand yet more power to the party machines and become either a rival to the Commons or a dumping ground for failed MPs, but a chamber made up of Honour recipients would provide an array of expertise and character that could be invaluable when reviewing legislation. The cross-bench peer Lord Bilimoria once claimed that he makes a habit of challenging people to name “a renowned world expert in any field in the House of Commons. They cannot name one.” The Honours list is very different: of the 1,195 most recent awards, 10 per cent were for work in education, 11 per cent for industry and the economy and 7 per cent for health, reflecting the contributions of everyone from an expert in molecular biology to Katherine Jenkins.

Honours would become more than just a handshake, and we’d be able to enjoy the benefits of having those who’ve made a genuine contribution to the country involved in running it. Respect for awards would go up, and sneers along the lines of “I won’t accept it, it’s a useless, distasteful imperial relic based on privilege and the monarchy” would become redundant.

Changing the significance of honours may change who gets them, and we might end up with a list of recommendations indistinguishable from the current life-peerage nominations. The meagre recognition for contributions to science and technology is also a cause for concern – just 2 per cent of the New Year’s awards; not remotely enough for the area on which so much of human progress depends. However, the inevitable increased scrutiny of the process would likely lead to a more suitably balanced list, and any one honours recipient would have far too small a chance of being selected to merit stuffing the ranks with party loyalists.

So, a more diverse and distinguished chamber, potentially providing us with expertise on everything from Tudor England and tropical medicine to the Beatles and world-class free kicks. The old House of Lords worked in practice but not in theory. The current setup does neither, but there’s no reason we can’t do both.